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Friday, 2 January 2015

When it comes to pens, there are a lot of choices, at a whole lot of price points. If you've been using pens that are readily available and can be had for cheap in drug stores and office supply stores, you might want to check out the class of pens of higher quality, and a little more cost. IMO it's money well spent.

One of my perennial favorites is the Fisher Space Pen. It's an improvement to the ballpoint pen that despite its name has many qualities that make it great for use on earth. Although Fisher pens are fine products (I carry the "Bullet" model in my back pocket every day), the ink cartridge is where all the magic happens. You can buy Fisher refills to use in other pen bodies, giving you a wide range of options. There are other makers of high quality pen cartridges too.

I was a kid in school when Flair brand felt tip pens became popular, and then fell out of favor. I've seen other gimmicks come and go, gel pens, fine tipped felt pens etc. I still keep going back to a well made ballpoint pen myself.

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Thanks, I had heard of "space pens" thanks to Seinfeld, but never Fisher. As for prices, someone showed me pens for $500.00-$4,000.00! I was not aware there were such things and said that was out of my league!

Paul C. Fisher developed the first "space pen" to be able to write in extreme environments, even upside down. When he patented his design in 1965, NASA, which had tried to develop its own zero-g pen, started buying Fisher pens for the Apollo missions. Even the Soviets bought 'em! Since being chosen by NASA carried lots of prestige, other pen makers made similar products, but Fisher was the original. They're still big with aviation, military and police users.

The Bullet model that I use costs $12 in matte black. That gets you the "space pen" cartridge and a heavy duty metal case, and even an o-ring to keep water out when the cap is on. Other Fisher models that have ornamental parts and/or gold plating cost more, but are still not quite up to the prices of the luxury pen genre.

When you pay $4000 for a pen, you're not paying for a better tool, you're paying for a status symbol and conspicuous consumption. My dad used to carry a Cross pen and mechanical pencil set in his shirt pocket, and I thought that was the best money could buy. And when it comes to function they're probably pretty close to as good as you can get. But the price is quite reasonable.

A good pen doesn't have to be costly. But since handwriting is on the wane, the places where you can get truly superior tools, or advice on what they are is becoming scarce. It's also a very personal item. To find what you're hoping for, you'll need to try lots of pens along the way.